by Arthur Kent
Frome got up, saw Curly busy straightening bric-a-brac on the desk. ‘Forget that, Curly, let’s get over to the cookshack and eat.’
Curly followed him. Frome stopped by the corral rail. He said:
‘Where’s your big brother Blacky Breslow?’
Dirk Breslow said, ‘He wasn’t along on this caper.’
‘Who’s herding the cattle then that you’ve had driven to Five Mile Canyon?’
‘You know that?’ Dirk Breslow snarled.
‘I overheard it. I reckon Blacky will be in charge of that. You’re hoping that Blacky’ll get free so that he can maybe shake you and Harry out of the Plattsville jail. Well, stop kidding yourself. How many men has Blacky got with him?’
‘You’ll never know; and you’ll never get him.’
‘Wishful thinking, Dirk.’ Frome led Curly to the cookhouse. The Breslows had started the cookfire and water was on the boil. Frome made coffee, and Curly found bread, biscuits and new-fangled apple pie in Long Will’s store.
They ate in silence. When he had finished and was rolling a cigarette, Frome said, ‘I’ve got a problem. I’ve got a tough ride ahead of me over narrow hill trails. I know the way, so I should make out. But you’ll have to stay behind, Curly.’ He looked at her. ‘I hate to leave you alone with those thugs out there.’
She said, ‘I can take care of myself. I’m good with the Winchester.’
‘OK, but don’t listen to anything from those Breslows. They’re desperate. They’ll hang and they know it. You’ll lock yourself in the cabin and stay there.’
She smiled wryly at the firmness in his voice. ‘You make it sound like an order.’
Frome said harshly, ‘It is an order.’
She smiled again. Frome got up, moved to the door, collecting some ropes on the way. ‘I’ll tie the Breslows good and tight. Only thing, you’re not to go near them. Not even to give them a drink, you understand?’
‘I understand, Dave.’
The softness in her voice made him swing towards her. He smiled down at her, took her in his arms, and kissed her. ‘It’s only that I want you safe, Curly. You know that?’
She nodded. She allowed him to kiss her again, and then she broke away. He led the way out of the shack. ‘Now get to the cabin and lock yourself in. Knowing Long Will, he should be back by noon tomorrow. Nothing can keep him away from his kitchen for long.’
Curly crossed to the cabin. Frome watched her go, then went to the corral. He put an extra rope on each man, and checked that the knots were tight. He went across the cabin, retrieved the dropped Winchester, and looked at Curly as she stood in the doorway, the light behind her. ‘See you tomorrow, Curly,’ he whispered.
‘Yes,’ she answered. She went into the cabin, then closed and locked the door.
Frome went back to the saddled ponies at the corral, selected the best one, took a carbine from the saddle bucket, and pushed the new Winchester there. He dumped the carbine in the barn, crossed to where Dirk Breslow was roped. His handgun flashed into his hand and swung upwards. ‘Don’t want you annoying the lady, Dirk,’ he said. And he laid the barrel across Breslow’s skull. The man groaned and his head fell forward.
Frome swung into the saddle of the sorrel he had selected and swung it out of the valley, heading for the dim line of the Arrows.
CHAPTER 14
Frome pushed a little shaggy mountain pony over a hump on the Arrow trail and saw Denton laid out on a carpet of grass fifteen miles along the prairie to his left. He had made good time after switching from the spent sorrel to one of old John Chiswick’s mountain ponies on the slopes of the hills.
He jerked the pony to a stop and, cocking a leg over the saddle horn and looking across at Denton, he built a smoke. Smoke spiralled from one chimney in the village. The black drape of night still curtained half the sky.
Frome smoked the cigarette, and rubbed his face, fighting off the urge for sleep. Then he started the pony moving down the narrow track for the prairie floor. Two miles down, the trail widened out and sank beneath a covering of timber. Frome pushed through the timber, finding narrow trails, and finally reached flat O Diamond graze.
It was getting on towards seven o’clock and the sun was a half disc on the horizon rim, when he splashed across a creek and came up into sight of the O Diamond headquarters. The day was just beginning on the horse ranch, and several men were washing in a large tub outside the bunkhouse.
The sound of Frome’s approach brought old Jacob Haines to the door of the cabin, and the men swinging from the tub. Haines came towards him, his wrinkled face splittering into laughter. Dismounting, Frome extended his hand and shook the old man’s.
‘Long time no see, Dave. What’s brought you this way?’
Frome said, ‘This isn’t a social call. You lost any stock, Jake?’
The old man stepped back, anger showing in his eyes. ‘Have I lost stock! Lost eleven horses I’d saddle broken three days ago from a meadow less than a mile away. Why, do you know something?’
Frome said he knew something. Haines grabbed his arm, leading him to the ranchhouse. ‘Let’s talk about it, Dave.’ He raised his voice. ‘Ma. We got a visitor – Dave Frome!’
Frome entered the long, log-beamed cabin. Several of the hands were already seated at a table. Ma Haines poked her head from a kitchen and greeted Frome. The rancher smelt frying eggs and bacon and boiling coffee.
Haines guided Frome to the table. He sat opposite, hawked forward, eager to hear the details. Frome told him everything, even mentioning that Kyle Bennett was behind it. The crew crowded into the cabin, forming a circle around them. Jacob Haines slammed the table. ‘What are we waiting for, let’s ride?’
Frome said, ‘There isn’t any hurry. The boys in the canyon won’t move off until Harry and Dirk Breslow return. And they can’t know yet that I’ve taken the Breslows and killed the rest of the gang they sent to Plattsville to get me.’
‘Huh-huh!’ Haines said. ‘How many do you reckon there are?’
‘Can’t be many left,’ Frome said. He looked around, counting. Including Haines, his sons, and himself, they were eight strong. ‘I reckon we should outnumber them by two to one.’
‘We know where they’re at, and we know the Five Mile Canyon like the backs of our hands,’ Haines said. He thumped the table impatiently. ‘Let’s saddle up.’
With the smell of the breakfast cooking, Frome felt his hunger. Ma Haines came out of the kitchen. ‘Hold on, Jake,’ she snapped. ‘Mister Frome’ll be hungry. And you can’t expect the boys to ride well on empty stomachs.’
Haines conceded that by wagging his head. He began to talk about Kyle Bennett’s plan. ‘Hell, I’ve never heard of a steal that big before. What in darnation is the world coming to?’
Frome said, ‘When you lost your horses, didn’t you check the canyon?’
Haines answered. ‘No, the sign read they all went the other way. We followed them for twenty miles on past Denton before we lost the sign. They must’ve doubled back over a hundred miles.’
Ma Haines brought platters of steaming eggs and bacon to the table. She served Frome and Haines first. Then the rest of the crew squatted round the table. Haines ate quickly, chewing and talking at the same time. He had never thought much of Kyle Bennett because of the manner in which the boy had deserted the breed woman at Denton. ‘I don’t begrudge a man his woman if he so fancies, but he’s got to care for her.’
Haines cleared his plate first. Still eating and ignoring his wife’s pleading that he should watch his digestion, he stomped across to a guns rack and lifted down an old Henry. He checked the load, strapped on a gunbelt, then began to cram cartridges into his pocket. ‘As soon as we’ve left, ma, you hitch up the team and head to Denton. Tell Keester to get out to the canyon with a posse. Warn him that if he’s slow in arriving, I’ll deal with any of the rustlers I catch alive. He’ll have a lynching then to explain away.’ Haines smiled. ‘That’ll shift him.’
When a couple of
the boys had nearly cleared their plates, Haines snapped, ‘You’ve eaten enough. Go and cut out the best broncs in the corrals.’
When Frome had finished his meal and exchanged news with Mrs Haines, fresh horses were in the yard, and all of the boys were armed. They swung into saddles, old Haines lifted his hat to his wife, and they swung out of the yard across the creek and curved left.
They galloped for six miles across grasslands which were only sparsely timbered, pushed through a stand of ragged juniper, and reached badlands, mile after mile of rock and sandy waste. Ahead of them, a jutting of the Arrows, was the Five Mile Canyon.
Frome could see that it was an ideal place to hide stolen stock. From its towering rim, a sentry could observe the country for miles around. He guessed that they had already been spotted, but Haines had expected and made plans for that. To put the sentry off, Haines swung the group hard right, leading them to cedar thickets which rolled up the slopes of the Arrows and away from the frontal entrance to the canyon.
Watching from above, the rustler lookout would believe that the O Diamond crew were combing the cedar thickets for wandered stock. To implant the idea further in the sentry’s mind, Haines gave a signal when the crew were a mile off the timbered slopes, and they fanned out.
They hit the brush and disappeared in a tangle of undergrowth. Following Haines, Frome smashed through creeper, arm raised to stop branches from striking his face. Some of the boys found wild broncs and flushed them out into the open. But they all kept moving to the left. Eventually they linked up, following a narrow trail in single file.
‘There isn’t a lot of time,’ Jake Haines observed. ‘That lookout will wonder what’s happened to us in a while. Old Lady Luck might be on our side, though. These rustlers mightn’t know that there’s a slit entrance to the canyon this way.’ He spat into a chokeberry bush. ‘It narrows to nothing nearly and is thickly overgrowed. We’ll have to funnel through for a spell single file.’
The brush cleared ahead and Frome saw the stream. Beyond the creek he saw the canyon wall. They crossed the creek, allowing the horses a drink, then pushed on, Jake Haines out in front, studying the canyon face. Haines twisted suddenly. ‘Hear that in the distance, Dave?’ Frome could hear nothing. ‘Your cattle bawling. They know pappy’s coming for them!’
Frome smiled. They began to climb. Then Frome saw the crevice in the canyon wall which was almost hidden by a tangle of brush. Haines swung. ‘Single file until it widens. Then we bunch up and hit the canyon basin at a gallop. The way I figure it, these rustlers’ll have their camp on a shelf more’n halfway down, facing the other way. When we spot it, we swing in, bounce off our ponies and start up the sides. If they’re more’n we can handle, just pin ’em down and wait for Keester to arrive. That sound OK to you, Dave?’
Frome nodded. Haines spat, hefted his Henry from his saddle bucket, and swung his pony up to the crevice. Frome took next place, lifting out his Winchester. They followed a narrow track between the towering walls for some fifty yards. Then Frome noticed the canyon wall lifted higher and also the trail widened.
Another fifty yards and it had widened so much that they could travel four abreast. Then suddenly the basin opened before them, and Frome could hear the cattle clearly. Jake Haines raised his rifle above his head and snapped, ‘Let’s ride ’em!’
It started as a trot, went into a canter as the canyon opened, then became a mad gallop as they hit the basin floor and widened out; eight riders, strung out, low in the saddle, hefting Winchesters, Spencers and Henrys, and yelling at the top of their voices.
The first thing Frome saw were his cattle grazing near a stream on the right of the basin. Next he spotted the rustlers’ camp, high in the rocks as Haines said it would be, where a tell-tale whiff of fire smoke pinpointed it. Dark against the grey and yellow rock, he could see men hurrying for cover.
Looking upwards to the rim, where the sentry might be posted, Frome saw sun flash on gun barrel. He judged that the man had one of them in his sights and was about to press the trigger. Several shots cracked out seconds later, and gunsmoke whipped up from the rustlers’ camp as the breeze caught it. The canyon walls took up the sound and multiplied it. Mushrooms of dust kicked up around the fast moving horses as the carbine bullets thudded into the ground. Just to the left of Frome, a pony took a slug in the head, turned a somersault over its head, sent a rider thumping to the ground.
They were curving in now, racing for the brush-covered slopes just to the left and below the camp.
Frome snatched his legs from the stirrups as the pony raced for the climb, then jack-knifed up and rolled from the bronc’s back. The ground rushed up, clouted him viciously, then he was scrambling for cover, his rifle lifted.
He hit the slope and flattened as a slug sent shale spitting at him. He scrambled on, moving for an arch of rocks. The sound of carbine bullets and galloping ponies seemed to be all around him. Reaching it, he looked back and saw a half a dozen riderless ponies turning away from the wall. Just below him, Jake Haines had hit dirt. The old man, now smiling, began to follow him. Here and there, Frome could see the rest of the O Diamond boys hunkering down or scrambling for cover.
Frome reached the rock formation, bellied down, poked the carbine through a groove and fired off a shot into the rock cluster above. He jacked the guard, fired again. Haines dropped beside him, kicking up grit.
Haines said: ‘They’re well fortified. This could be a long siege.’
Frome said, ‘I don’t know about that. They’ve got so much rock around them, that it could mean their death. Look, Jake, at the way the rock face just above them curves under.’
Haines said, ‘I see it.’ Then he chuckled. ‘I see what you mean. But we’d need to be a bit higher.’
‘Then let’s get weaving.’
They came up together, began to run up the slope. The heavy climb exhausted them, brought the sweat to their hands and faces. Dust came up beneath their bodies, pinpointing them for the rustlers. Slugs ripped into the brush around them. Heavy firing came from beneath them as the O Diamond boys fired from cover. Then Frome reached an outcropping, dropped, poked his gaze over the top, saw the way the enemy stronghold sat, and grunted with satisfaction. Haines dropped breathless beside him.
He said, ‘This is just right, Dave. We’ll cut ’em to pieces.’
They poked their carbines over the rockrim, aiming for the fall-away rock, and began firing. The bullets tore at the rock surface, and ricocheted into the camp with whining sounds. Frome kept pumping the shots at the rock from his thirteen-shot Winchester. He saw chips spindle out from the wall, tearing at the unprotected backs of the rustlers, and judged that most of the slugs would be bouncing that way.
Now the rest of the O Diamond boys got the idea. Instead of aiming slugs at the rocks behind which the desperadoes sheltered – slugs which bounced back on the slope – they aimed for the wall behind.
Frome judged that there had been four men firing from the camp, and another – the lookout – from the rockrim. But firing soon tapered off from the camp when Frome and the O Diamond men pumped ricocheting shells into the camp at fifty per minute.
Frome pushed thirteen fresh slugs into his carbine, and fired them off at the rock in as many seconds. And then Haines shouted above the snarl of shot and tortured metal that the rustlers weren’t firing any more. Frome got a vivid imagined picture of the survivors clawing among the rocks, looking for protection from the bouncing shells and rock splinter.
Frome said, ‘You’d better move in on it with your boys. I’m going after that sonofabitch on the rim.’
Haines grunted, came up, springing over the rock and waving his men on. Frome moved also, zig-zagging up the slope, racing for the canyon rim. He passed beyond the camp. He was within yards of the canyon roof, and then shots began to groove into the rocks around him. Rock splinter razored his cheek, brought the warm blood to his face. Another bullet gouged up dust between his scissoring feet. Frome pointed his carbine up, b
ut the sun was too bright over the rim, blinding him. He realized that he was a sitting duck. He realized that the next rifle bullet could shatter him, and send him skidding down the slope.
He fired then, aiming his shots for a blurred line where he imagined the rim to be. He fired once, then he fired again. He hammered off his shells until the Winchester was empty. Then, dropping it, he lifted a Colt, fanned the hammer, emptying the gun along the rim. No more shots came. He pouched the sixgun, and began to climb again. Weaving for the top, clutching at rough brush and slippery rock, anything which touched his searching hands. The sun still dazzled him.
He hit the rim at last, folding over it, bringing up his other Colt. He got a momentary impression of a beard-visored face above a rock formation. A bullet cut air inches from his face. Frome punched off two shots at the rocks, then brought his legs over the rim and rolled for cover.
Silence. Had he hit the man? Too much to hope for, he thought. Better to be safe than sorry. He lay tight against the sun-hot rock, pushing fresh shells from his belt into both Colts. The sound of sporadic firing came up from the slope below. Frome thought grimly that Jake Haines would be finishing off the rustlers. He knew Jake’s philosophy. Why keep the poor critters about when they had to hang eventually anyway? That was the way Jake thought. Best get it over with. A bullet’s quicker than the rope. Be merciful and finish it right away.
Frome moved then, bellying out across the flat rock for cover nearer to the rock formation. He was inches from the rock when sunlight touched on steel. Two bullets screeched off rock inches from him. Frome fired, moved for cover. Again silence, but he knew the sentry was still alive, and knew where he was. But how to reach him? He took a quick look over the rocks, and saw that the ground between him and the ridge was crinkled and pitted. Further over to the right, great slashes and shallows bisected the ground. Frome rolled over and away. He began to wriggle to the right of the sentry’s position.
